CONSORTIUM

Others have pointed out that Consortium is short and ends on a cliffhanger. Let me tell you the worst part: It forces you to sit through a rambling 10-minute briefing for a mission that's not even in the game - and would require you to spend $25+ on the sequel. If that sequel is ever finished. Consortium is a "standalone arc" that tasks you with "investigating an on-board murder" but there is no genuine investigation here. You don't search for clues or piece together evidence. You just speak to the right person and get fed the answer. You can't even do anything sensible with that knowledge - at least, I couldn't. When I asked for proof, the game interpreted my choice as "Forget any kind of interrogation or confinement, just drop it and let the suspect roam free." [Spoiler]When this inevitably led to disaster I was chided for shooting said suspect in self-defense despite my critically damaged heart, lungs, and severe hemorrhaging[/spoiler] The writing is flawed, but Consortium IS good when it gets out of its own way and lets you explore the branching dialogue and quasi-real-time happenings. If the devs had trimmed the fat and focused on this, it would be a great experience. Unfortunately, there's little incentive to replay the game and explore the potential branches, because Consortium [i]insists[/i] on getting in its own way. Cumbersome controls and interfaces make everything a bigger chore than it has to be, whether it's opening a locker, navigating ladders and invisible terrain obstructions, or reading the hundreds pages of lore you're seemingly expected to pore over. (Oh, and you're expected to have played a tie-in AR game, too) Objectives can be frustrating. There are times its seems obvious you should speak to someone, but you can't interact with them until you've tripped the right progression flag. There's also a quest about malfunctioning equipment that ironically seems to have bugged out for me, since I searched high and low multiple times and couldn't resolve it. The combat and inventory management are uniquely awful and frustratingly pointless, and seem to exist only as an implicit promise of future content. The game would be better without them. But for yours truly, the biggest barrier to replayability is the TWO unskippable, self-indulgent word vomits that last 10 minutes and refuse to get to the point - one of which, as previously mentioned, is a briefing for a mission that's not even in the game! That is [i]profoundly[/i] disrespectful to the player, and it is the point where I completely stopped caring. [spoiler]It's also the point where the game broke the 4th wall to tell me that I, the player, have no choice but to continue - which is interesting, since the next game is as yet unfinished and I have no intention of purchasing it, but Consortium undermining its own concept in its closing moments is fitting for a game so blighted by self-sabotage.[/spoiler] Consortium, honestly, has a lot of passion and ambition. But it's that ambition that ultimately holds it back. It also seems frustratingly blind to its own flaws, which makes improvement unlikely no matter how many updates, versions or sequels are released. Which is a shame, because there's promise and excitement here. But sadly, the bad not only outweighs the good by a wide margin, it actively inhibits it.

Consortium is a deep simulation of a small space. You're free to engage as much or as little with the plot and characters as you'd like. Time ticks on, and so too do events in the simulation - with or without you. Walk around, live the life, tease out the plot, and react to events as you feel is appropriate. Or maybe "pre-act" to events if you want to test the simulation. Go wild. This is one of those "devs thought of everything" kinda games, so you're going to find the game playing right along with you. You have a great degree of individual narrative agency, but you're not in complete control. Interaction is like a conversation, and the best kinds of conversations are the ones where you feel like you contributed, learned, and came to new understanding. You know the kind, right? It's where you feel like you're glowing from within when you think about it, even years later. And it has been years. As I write this, it's been almost a full decade. You'd think in ten years of video games that surely there are newer, deeper, more interesting examples out there of this kind of game, right? IF THERE WERE, WHY WOULD I BE WRITING A REVIEW ABOUT A TEN YEAR OLD GAME? Ten years were chewed up and spit out by the game industry reinventing skill trees, jiggle physics, and flag collection and whatever else. Consortium served us a small taste of a future of interactive narrative gaming that DIDN'T HAPPEN. As such, Consortium remains one of the best examples of narrative interactivity in video gaming. Yeah, the game has flaws. The shooting felt shallow and janky at release, and the game abruptly ends in a cliffhanger. Does that put you off at all? Don't let it. Consortium is petite Westworld Star Trek.

Here I will leave the cat, friends who pass by can pet it and give it a thumbs up 　　　 　　／＞　　フ 　　　 　　| 　_　 _ l 　 　　 　／` ミ＿xノ 　　 　 /　　　 　 | 　　　 /　 ヽ　　 ﾉ 　 　 │　　|　|　| 　／￣|　　 |　|　| 　| (￣ヽ＿_ヽ_)__) 　＼二つ

Bad game : poor design, bad choices from the developers, lack of rhythm, ridiculous combat system. There are some good ideas but it goes off in all directions. The execution is not great. This is definitely not worth it.

⣿⣿⣿⡟⠁⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠙⣿⣿⣿⣿ ⣿⣿⣿⠁⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠈⢿⣿⣿ ⣿⣿⡇⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⢀⣀⣀⣤⣶⣦⣤⣤⣤⣤⣄⣄⠄⠸⣿⣿ ⣿⣿⠁⠄⠄⢀⣠⣾⣿⣿⣥⣤⣶⣶⡖⢻⣿⣿⡥⣤⣤⣉⣦⢹⣿ ⣿⣿⡆⠄⠄⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⢽⠉⠙⣻⣿⣿⣿⣶⢟⠛⢻⡇⢸⣿ ⣿⣿⣿⠄⠄⣿⣿⢿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⢻⣿⣷⣾⣿⡈⣿ ⣿⣿⣿⣷⣸⣿⣿⠸⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⡿⢿⣿⣿⣄⠙⣿⣿⣿⠇⣿ ⠉⠉⠉⠉⠁⣿⣿⣆⠹⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣄⣹⣏⣿⡋⣸⣿⣿⠟⣰⣿ ⠄⠄⠄⠄⠄⣿⣿⣿⣷⣌⠛⢿⣿⣏⣉⠛⠛⠛⠛⢻⣿⡇⣾⣿⣿ ⠄⠄⠄⠄⢸⣿⣿⣯⣿⣿⣷⣄⠙⢿⣿⣿⣿⣷⣦⡀⠙⡴⢟⣿⣿ ⠄⠄⠄⢠⣿⣿⣟⣯⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣶⣤⣉⣉⠉⠉⠰⣷⣼⣿⣿⣿ Why there are so few games like this... ...its just the Deus System EX-Shock we always wanted, but shorter. p.s. get Consortium Remastered :)

Bad writing and weird obsession with chess.

Boring

I "beat" the game once, but it's heavily advised you replay it at least once and the game itself encourages a degree of save scumming. So this review is caveated by me technically only having played at most half of the overall experience. The dialogue system is great and by far the highlight of the game, with lots of options that affect your relationships and the evolution of the story. Voice acting is stellar for an indie title, music is great and the game runs well for the most part. I like how you have to piece the background of the story together from conversations and context clues, and it doesn't baby you at all, although there is an in-game news board if you want to understand things a bit better. Complaints: loading times are abysmal for a game that is clearly not graphically intense at all, though fortunately there are very few loading screens once you are actually in the game. I wish there was a bit more interactivity in the environments for how detailed they are but I like how you can burn yourself on the ovens in the galley haha. The combat is just okay; fortunately all the combat in this game is technically optional (if you make the right dialogue choices) and you don't miss anything just setting the game to easy mode.